


believe

by OnyxSphynx



Series: newmann one-shots [28]
Category: Pacific Rim (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hopeful Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Movie: Pacific Rim: Uprising (2018), look the precursors fucked newt up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-07
Updated: 2019-03-07
Packaged: 2019-11-13 03:30:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18023927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OnyxSphynx/pseuds/OnyxSphynx
Summary: Post-Uprising, Newt is having hallucinations of Hermann





	believe

**Author's Note:**

> for the anon prompt: "newmann angstish prompt list 12? Xx"
> 
> 12: "“You’re hurting me”

“You’re hurting me.” 

The words are spoken softly, a sharp contrast to the pain that they belay. Newt shakes his head, tries to dislodge the sound. He knows what he’ll see when he opens his eyes; it’s what he sees every night.

The image of Hermann, eyes wide and terrified as his hands tighten around his neck is seared into the insides of his eyelids. What little control he had, in that moment, to choke out  _They’re in my head—_ sapped away within seconds, leaving Newt to be shoved into the deep, dark recesses of his mind by the Precursors.

He knows two things when they finally manage to get rid of the hive-mind:

They ( _he_ ) tried to end the world.

They ( _he_ ) killed Hermann, and thus, ended his own world.

They’re surprised when he spends his time staring listlessly at the white, padded walls of the cell, but Newt hasn’t the energy to do anything else; he killed Hermann (the Precursors may have tightened the grip, but they were still his hands on Hermann’s neck) and thus, a part of him has died as well.

“Please, Newton, darling, let go,” comes the voice, again, and he wonders what it’ll be this time. Will he open his eyes to find Hermann’s head at an unnatural angle, or will there only be bruises to attest to the last time Newt ever touched him?

When he does manage to muster up the energy, he’s greeted by Hermann in a dust-specked blazer and sweater-vest, a brace on his neck. He smiles at Newt tentatively. “This is a new one,” Newt croaks, voice drained. Stares through the physicist’s apparition. “Usually you’re more…dead. Hah.”

He lets out a dry chuckle, and hallucination-Hermann shoots him a worried look. Really, it’s almost funny. “This is…nice, though,” he muses. “That my mind’s decided to make you…nice. We always used to fight, you know? Before, that is.”

Hermann tugs at his arm, and Newt realizes belatedly that he’s gripping the other’s wrist.  _He’s dead, just a hallucination, he can’t be hurting._ He jerks his hand away anyway. 

“Newton?” Hermann questions, raising a hand to his cheek. “Are you—are you quite alright?”

The laugh Newt lets out is borderline hysterical, tinged with a deep, dark pain, and he’s doubled over, despite the restraints binding him fairly tightly to the chair. With tears streaming down his face, he supposes he must be a sight to see. “I’m fine, just peachy-keen, sitting here in a straight-jacket talking to my dead frie— _c_ _olleague_ ,” he corrects himself. “Colleague. You’d’ve preferred that, wouldn’t you? I mean, the—the professionalism.”

“Newton—” the look on the hallucination’s face reads  _longing_ and  _pain_. It’s a good impersonation of Hermann, but Newt knows better. (He’d never act like this around Newt.) There’s a catch in his voice, almost convincingly real. “Please, Newton, I’m not—”

“You’re dead,” Newt says hollowly. “You’re dead and I killed you and no amount of pretending is going to change a thing. You died because I accepted that offer from Shao, because I let my feelings get in the way of our professional relationship, and I couldn’t deal. You’re  _dead_ , Hermann, and my mind is playing tricks on me.”

The slap rings in his ears, the sharp pain flaring on his cheek. Hermann stands in front of him, trembling slightly, one hand clenched around his cane and the other raised. “I’m  _not dead_ ,” he hisses, venom and hellfire, panting slightly. “You didn’t—you didn’t  _kill me_.”

For a second, Newt stares at him, and then he begins to cry in earnest. Great big, shuddering sobs wrack his frame, even restrained at the wrists and ankles as he is. Hermann places a hand on his cheek. “Hush, darling, it’s going to be alright,” he soothes, drawing closer so that Newt can rest his head on his shoulder, and presses his lips to the crown of Newt’s head. “I’m here, Newton. I’m here for you. We’re going to get through this, together.”

For the first time in years, Newt believes.


End file.
